Arashiyama — Landscapes of Old Kyoto

A day in Arashiyama is also a journey through three different gardens and three eras of Japanese history.

The Sogen Pond at Tenryu-ji has preserved almost entirely the composition created by Muso Soseki nearly seven hundred years ago. The mountains of Arashiyama become part of the garden through the technique of “borrowed scenery,” and the gaze naturally shifts from stones and water to the wooded slopes beyond.

Along the path to Adashino Nenbutsu-ji stand 1,200 statues of rakan, each carved by individual pilgrims over ten years, beginning in 1981. In this ancient temple space, the presence of people from our own time is still felt.

In the Shofuen Garden at Matsuo Taisha Shrine, master Mirei Shigemori combined ancient iwakura, Heian-period streams, and Horai islands from the Kamakura period with modern materials and forms. This garden became his final work, completed in 1975.

Seven centuries, several decades, and half a century. In Arashiyama, different eras do not simply succeed one another, but coexist, revealing themselves to the traveler within a single day.